Right now, there was nothing more valuable than time. By now, every Master was probably scrambling to get Caster’s head on a platter. With additional Command Seals as a prize, everyone will sure be pursuing Caster.

Including him.

As someone with a Servant like Alexander, Command Seals were his last resort—and he wouldn’t hand them over, no matter what the circumstances.

No matter who he is, for a Servant to be of the Caster class, it went without saying that he must have a number of tricks up his sleeves. The ones who could challenge him head on without any preparation were probably the ones like the Saber Class, who boast of a powerful Magic Resistance Skill. In comparison, Rider, who was outside the Knight Classes, would generally require at least some strategy to face such an opponent in an area Caster had already prepared.

As a Magus, Waver understood the threat of another magi’s ‘Magic Workshop.’ In comparison, he judged Rider’s Magic Resistance to be of a D rank, which could cancel only Single-Action spells…even so, they would have to proceed, even with that fairly meager defense.

But it put them at an obvious disadvantage compared to the competition; Archer had a C rank and Lancer who had B rank, making them capable of cancelling spells of two and three verses, respectively—it would be difficult for them to be affected in battle, even by Caster.

And against Saber, who could be considered immune to modern magi, and Berserker, who was like a Divine Spirit in the water…

They were at a definite disadvantage, in this regard.

Because of that, the solution was obvious; the best way to deal with this problem would be to lure Caster into a battle with either Saber or Berserker, and let him be torn apart. But if he did that…the Command Seals he was striving for would elude him.

More to the point, proposing an alliance with Berserker would be pointless—Rider’s pride would never allow it, and using a Command Seal to force him would be pointless; it was useless to spend Command Seals to gain them. It would do little more than earn him Rider’s enmity.

Proposing an alliance with Saber would be pointless as well; what reason would a Servant that was immune to knowledge have to ally with someone who wasn’t against a magic user?

And again, Rider’s pride probably wouldn’t allow it.

Waver stifled a sigh. Truly, his Servant was troublesome. He refused to stay dematerialized and, after seeing Saber, Berserker, and Archer do it, had insisted to wear modern clothing. Naturally, Waver had been forced to buy his clothes for him.

Naturally, since he was always materialized, he had also been noticed by the family they were staying with, who Waver had hypnotized into believing he was their grandson. Rider was now staying as his friend from overseas.

“Oi, kid, I have that thing you sent me to get!” Rider bellow, dropping the bag in front of him.

Waver was annoyed to realize that he wasn’t even annoyed anymore; he was starting to get used to Rider.

Repressing another sigh, he opened the bag, removing the twenty four stoppered test tubes. Each was labeled alphabetically and filled with water.

Waver quickly cleared the table and took out his whole set of experimental tools—one of the few items he had taken with him from London. He then selected several vials of ores and reagents, spirit lamp mortar, and a dropper.

He selected the complimentary reagents and mixed them together—what he was doing was something that he’d repeated countless times at the Clock Tower; even with his eyes closed, he would do it perfectly.

“Just to be sure, you did mark the places on the map correctly, right?” He asked.

“Who could possibly make a mistake on something as simple as that?” Rider grumbled, tossing him the map.

Fuyuki’s complete map, marked carefully with symbols of the alphabet, each a place Rider had collected water from the Mion River.

Even so, Waver was a bit disappointed. He had expected to compete glamorously in the Holy War as a Servant’s Master. And yet, here he was, repeating the same basic experiments he had for years.

Unplugging the stopper of test tube A, he dropped a bit of the reagent into it.

The instantaneous reaction exceeded his expectations. The water immediately turned a rusty red color.

“What on Earth is this?” Rider asked. Waver had expected him to go back to watching his videos, but instead he was watching the experiment intently.

Explaining was troublesome, but a barrage of questions would be even more so, so he answered.

“The remains of magecraft in the water.”

‘A’ was the place where the river mouth met the sea. As such, it was the obvious place to start, even if the reaction was abnormal.

“…Boy, did you realize from the beginning that the water of the river was like this?”

“Of course not! But this city has a river running through it; it’s natural to start investigating from the water!”

When searching for a magus, the easiest way was the ‘Water’ element. At its base, water was something that flows from a higher place to a lower one; compared to the effort needed to calculate the winds direction and detect the earth’s pulse, finding the lowest point of water was a simple matter. This was especially true for lands with rivers. As such, he had decided to start his search with the simplest method, but it seemed he had already drawn the ‘winner.’

One by one, he tested the tubes. As he headed up stream, the reaction got stronger and stronger and his reaction quickly changed from surprise to shock. For a reaction like this, the only explanation was for the Workshop to have been set up in the middle of the river and to have discarded his wastes with no preparations at all. Such a magus is less than third-rate; if anything, this was the mistake of a newbie.

And yet, discovering his opponent in such a way didn’t make Waver feel proud at all. He’d expected to have to exhaust his ingenuity and compete against wonders with his own in a ‘Magecraft Competition,’ but what he was doing now was more like a mundane police forensic.

The reaction of ‘P’ was pitch-black. If it got any darker than this, he might need to use a more advanced method to continue the analysis, but when he tested ‘Q’ there was no reaction. The water remained clear no matter how he shook it.

Waver opened the map and located P and Q.

“Rider, between these two points, what is there? A draining trench? An irrigation channel?”

“That’s it! In all probability, that’s the location of Caster’s Workshop!”

With a solemn face, Rider gazed at his Master closely.

“Oi, boy. Could it be you’re actually some excellent magus?” He wondered.

Waver snorted and turned away.

“This is not something a great magus would do; this is the method of the worst of the worst. Are you making fun of me?”

“What are you talking about? If you achieving great results with poor methods, isn’t that a greater achievement then having used better methods? You should be proud of yourself! As your Servant, I too am proud!” Rider laughed. “After all, after grasping the enemy’s location, it’s my turn, right? Come one, boy; let’s attack at once!”

“H-hey! The opponent is still a Caster—attacking his Workshop without any plan might be a little foolhardy!”

“In war, the enemy’s position can change at any time. If you know there position and don’t strike quickly, there may not be time for regret!”

“…You’re really fired up, today. Does this competition really have you that excited?”

“Of course! And not only that, but my Master has shown some outstanding results. In that case, bringing back the head of the enemy as repayment; that is my pride as a Servant!”

In that moment, Waver wondered…the soldiers that had served under this former King of Conquerors…had they been swept away across Asia like this as well?

Then again in a world where equivalent exchange is a magical law, perhaps working smart really doesn't produce as much success on its own as hard work.

Either way, I would expect Alexander to be pleased by getting the correct results with such a simple method. He was a general, he of all people should know that as your strategy and methodology increases in complexity, the chance of failure rises almost exponentially. What Rider said isn't how I would put it, but he did get the point across nicely.

If Percy doesn't beat Team Awesome to Caster, he'll probably be second. Maybe third to Kiritsugu. Gilgamesh ought to be last, which should rankle.

Then again in a world where equivalent exchange is a magical law, perhaps working smart really doesn't produce as much success on its own as hard work.

Either way, I would expect Alexander to be pleased by getting the correct results with such a simple method. He was a general, he of all people should know that as your strategy and methodology increases in complexity, the chance of failure rises almost exponentially. What Rider said isn't how I would put it, but he did get the point across nicely.

If Percy doesn't beat Team Awesome to Caster, he'll probably be second. Maybe third to Kiritsugu. Gilgamesh ought to be last, which should rankle.

Click to expand...

Gilgamesh is in league with Kotomine and thus Assassin. He could find out in about ten seconds, because they've had Caster's location all day.

Well, if Waiver was able to identify Caster's position through a high-concentration of magical run-off in the water, I would assume he is going to arrive second the Percy. After all, the local waters have become Percy's defacto prana supplier and the other masters already know that he is at his strongest in the water. One would think that he would be keeping a careful watch on them.

Whats the point of the hunt if you can't show your superior skill to the competion?

One thing though that suprised me is that Waver didn't detect anything from Berzerker, or rather that Berzerker didn't foul up any of his tests, what with him almost certainly having enchanted a HUGE portion of the water around the city, to say nothing of the fact he was sitting in it for several hours at least.

Percy doesn't need to enchant water, his ability to use it comes from his heritage/NP. He doesn't actually do anything to it, it's all him. And I thought that seen where he is in the water is when he is out of town, because he was checking on Kariya?

Wait, he didn't have to do *anything* at all to the water when he created the tsunami? I understand he is the equivilent of "god of the sea" when activating his NP, but I thought there was (at a minimum) at least *some* magic put into the water? Am I mistaken on this?

I thought the free-for-all did not happen at the river but the ocean? If so, then magic residue or not, Waver would not detect anything of Percy's power since he was only testing the river. Plus, Percy's ability seems more natural and less... "polluting" then the magus equivilant of dumping toxic waste directly into the river. So even if some of Percy's prana was in the river, it would probably be drowned out by Caster's dumping.

The fight didn't happen by the river; it happened on the sea shore, a ways away from it. He does have to put energy into it, but as a 'Divine Spirit,' his power's not nearly as noticeable in water as Caster's, who uses the River to get rid of the horribly mutilated corpses of the people he violently killed, so it wouldn't matter, even if they fought by the River.

It fact, it would probably wouldn't matter, even if he wasn't a Divine Spirit at all. What Caster's doing really is the equivalent of dumping toxic waste in the water.

Hmmm, something about this doesn't seem right. That test was to detect any magecraft at all, not Caster's specifically right? I have the feeling Rider stumbled onto something else with this one.

EDIT: Or I could be wrong, seeing as I just noticed that the post saying Caster was dumping bodies into the river was made by Ryuugi himself.

Click to expand...

Outside of whatever is left of the worms Wormface used that Percy killed in mass numbers, there shouldn't be any other mages in Fuyuki City at that time that aren't part of the Grail War. And none of the other mages (at least, in canon) had/have any reason or desire, to use magecraft on the city's water supply.

So either there is a complete unknown variable/person involved that isn't part of the original F/Z canon, or its Caster doing body dumps. And unless Ryuugi wants to go completely off the rails really early into things (beyond the beach fight), he's likely wanting to keep things simple. Occam's Razor and all = Its Caster.

Berserker—or rather, Mrs. O’Leary—had tracked Caster’s scent back to the River. At that point, Berserker was kind of marveling at his lucky—there must be something in the water that kept drawing his opponents to it, or something.

As soon as he reached the river, he decided to leave Mrs. O’Leary behind. If he needed her aid, it would be simply to call for her, and bringing her in would only endanger her needlessly. While having her on his side was always a huge advantage, given her size, strength, and experience, but her ability to shadow travel was probably her most dangerous feature, and Berserker didn’t want to risk it.

Well, that, and the simple fact that he didn’t want her to get hurt. It may have been silly, looking after a dog that was the size of a truck, but while strong, she wasn’t invulnerable.

He was.

So if anyone was going to be walking into enemy territory with no idea what was wait for him there, it would be him. He’d be fine, this close to the water and he could always call her again if he needed too.

The first thing he noticed upon diving into the water was that it felt…wrong. Almost as if it was polluted, but not quite. He knew what pollution felt like, but this was something else…something magical in nature.

He frowned at a sudden thought. Magical pollution, maybe?

Well, he’d seen weirder things…

It was definitely moving past him, so the source came a bit further upstream. He stayed underwater, even as the water pushed him forward like the current didn’t exist. He could tell where things were located underwater, and even though it wasn’t solid, he knew where the source of the ‘pollution’ was coming from.

An entrance to some kind of sewer system.

He paused at the entrance in disgust, which was the only reason he noticed them.

Half buried at the bottom of the river, being nibbled at by fish, were disfigured bodies that might have looked exactly like the ones in the morgue, if not for being mostly eaten. Rather than float, they’d had so many wounds that they had simply sunk.

And the number of them…

Berserker’s hands clinched into fists as he forced himself to turn away from the ruined bodies. Burying his disgust beneath his rage, he entered the sewer.

The bottom of the tunnel was wet—and not just with water. But he ignored everything else, both the blood and the strange fluids he didn’t recognize, and continued deeper in. As long as there was water, it didn’t matter—he’d find Caster and then he would kill him.

Or at least, that was what he’d expected to find, but instead he found a nest of monsters. Squirming inhuman creatures that possessed countless tentacles, they were crowded together within the tunnel. In the same way he understood the behavior of all aquatic creatures, he immediately knew what they were doing—they were lying in wait for any trespassers to devour.

And the moment he realized that—because he realized that—he understood.

These alien monsters…without a doubt, they were aquatic creatures. Not from any sea he’d ever known, but they were. That’s what left behind those traces on the corpses in the morgue.

And as all creatures that fell under his dominion did, they too recognized him for who and what he was.

The reaction was instantaneous. It was not a show of respect. It was not a submission. As one, with cries of words and emotions that were impossible to understand, they reached out for his with twisting, grasping tentacles.

They were fast—by the standards of a human. But Berserker could easily have dodged. Should have easily dodged.

And yet, he didn’t. For nothing was right in that tunnel.

The words, actions, voices, and expressions of those monsters…they were not something a human could understand.

But facts and possibilities were nothing compared to the power of ‘Deception of Divinity.’ It wrote over the ‘truth’ with a ‘lie’ and that ‘lie’ became the new ‘truth.’

And the truth was, Berserker was the God of the Ocean. Not any specific Ocean, for his legend had taken him across the world, to places beyond even his father’s dominion—just the ‘Ocean.’ Not as a place, but as a concept. It was not even limited to salt water, stretching the definition to cover the concept of ‘Water’ as well. It did not matter where that water was, for Berserker’s power had worked in the land beyond the gods, just as it had worked in the Underworld.

No matter the location, if it was a ‘Sea’ or even just made of ‘Water,’ he was definitely its ‘God’ and definitely understood his ‘subjects.’ He could communicate with anything that lived beneath the surface.

Even if that Ocean was beyond the veil of this Reality.

Even if the things that lurked beneath its depths were horrible beyond words.

Yes, he was definitely their God, even if they already had another.

And of their horrible, impossible language…of course, he understood every word.